


Adhara, Avior, Gienah

by akaparalian



Series: Celestial Navigation [1]
Category: Temeraire - Naomi Novik
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-25 16:54:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21359521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akaparalian/pseuds/akaparalian
Summary: “But clearly, Laurence,” Temeraire said stubbornly, “since you are an omega, and a captain, and no one has ever had any cause to complain about you, that must be proof that an omegacando whatever he should wish, and do it well.”
Relationships: Minor or Background Relationship(s), William Laurence & Temeraire
Series: Celestial Navigation [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1539808
Comments: 18
Kudos: 209





	Adhara, Avior, Gienah

**Author's Note:**

> So! Hello! I... am here today to share with you something that has been lingering on my drive since this summer. For a while, I was thinking of this as the first chapter of one larger, contiguous piece, but the more I thought about it lately, the more I realized it worked pretty well as a standalone, and then there's another few 'chapters' (about ~75% complete) which could also be combined into a standalone, and maybe this whole thing would work better as a series than one very long fic... So, here we are!
> 
> This part is SFW and gen; following parts are NSFW (um, very) and not-gen, so bear that in mind, I suppose! But again, this stands alone pretty well, I think, so you don't need to worry about reading the rest if that's not your cup of tea. (That's another reason I decided to split it up like this, actually.)
> 
> That being said, I hope you enjoy!
> 
> (And: thanks to Tamara and Meg for betaing/cheerleading this in its infancy!)

Of course, when he first ran off and joined the service, Laurence had had no idea at all that he might turn out to be an omega.

To be quite honest, he had tried his very hardest not to consider even the shadow of the possibility, and at the still-tender age of twelve, it hadn’t been terribly difficult to avoid. There had been years yet, at that time, before he would present at all, and by that time he hoped to be a midshipman at the very least, and perhaps, he had told himself in the very few moments where he allowed himself to even think in circles _around_ the idea, things would work out, if the worst were to come to pass. Perhaps he could find some way around it; surely there must be some solution. He was dedicated to serving his country and his God, and to knowing the sea as much as the sea could ever be known. Surely if he could do these things well and with honor, some solution might be reached if he _were_ to present as an omega.

By the time he is sixteen and barred into a small, dingy room at an inn of somewhat dubious repute, it is far too late for there to be any alternative to his staying in the Navy, designation be damned. He can be grateful only that the thrice-damned heat had happened to come on while he was in port. Even as he lays there in his own sweat and slick and spend, he stares up at the ceiling and thinks grimly to himself, with the sort of singular and somewhat naive determination which is often attributed to young people, but which Laurence will never grow out of, that he will just have to find a way, because omega or not, he would sooner leap headfirst into the sea than go back to a life on shore.

There _are_ omegas in the Navy, because Laurence is not the first young man to present after already having come into some small distinction; usually, those who have proven themselves already to be an asset to their captain and serve well are not dismissed, though the less skillful are sometimes quietly packed back to their families with an honourable discharge not unlike a very odd sort of dowry. But once a young man presents as an omega, he is thoroughly off the track to become captain of his own vessel, at least if said vessel is to be larger than a dinghy. An omega might make lieutenant, perhaps, by the end of his career, but even then he will not really be given the opportunity to serve with true distinction or courage, instead kept to somewhat safer postings, which in turn offer far less opportunity to earn the regard of his superiors. And, anyway, it is well understood that these men are likely to leave the service of their own accord as soon as they should find a mate, and they are often thus relegated to yet less bellicose positions, whether formally or informally, typically serving as personal aides or secretaries to those officers who should deign to offer them such a position, almost as a young lady serving as a governess until she make a suitable match.

So, no, Laurence decides as he rather grimly makes his way through that first heat, all the while trying not to think too hard about what his body is doing. None of the typical career paths available to an omega in His Majesty’s Navy will do at all; he is still just as determined as he had been the day before the heat had struck to serve to the fullest extent of his abilities, which certainly does _not_ mean spending the rest of his life as an aide, if he can possibly help it. All that is left, then, is to discover the reality of the solutions he had half-dubiously assured himself existed when he had first gone to sea.

His heat lasts only three days, but he has leave for only four before he needs to be back aboard, and surely he has already been missed by his fellows at the very least; he will have to come up with some excuse to satisfy them, though given that he has lost nearly a stone in weight and looks rather haggard even after his best attempts to clean himself up, it doesn’t seem to him that it will be hard to convince his fellows and his commanders that he had fallen terribly ill and hidden in an inn to ride it out — which is, after all, not even truly a lie.

By the time he comes downstairs on the morning of his last day of leave, it is quite obvious that the innkeeper and his wife, at least, are well aware what he has been going through. This is no real surprise. He had been in such a state when he first showed up at their door that, in hindsight, he knows he hadn’t been terribly subtle; and there aren’t all that many reasons that a boy of sixteen should lock himself up in a lonely room and not emerge for three days, even for meals. And besides_ that_, it must have been hard to miss the smell.

Twice he had found water left for him when he slept, and simple, bland meals of bread and porridge, which he supposes he has these strangers to thank for. Sure enough, the innkeeper’s wife looks at him with sympathy born of shared experience when he finally emerges, and when he awkwardly stumbles through thanking her for watching after him, she only asks him matter-of-factly if he has anyone to turn to for help with these matters.

“I —” Laurence says, caught off guard. As of yet, he is not certain of any part of this situation, other than that he absolutely should not draw attention to the fact that he is a Navy man; better not to draw any connection at all between his designation as an omega and his service. “I — well, no, I suppose not.”

“Well,” the woman replies briskly, taking him by the arm despite a brief, token protest and pulling him after her into the inn’s store-room, “no one should go without knowing a few basics, at least.”

Though having that sort of conversation with a woman who is really a perfect stranger is a special kind of mortifying, Laurence is nevertheless incredibly grateful for the information she shares with him — mostly a few home remedies for heats, in the form of herbal blends which seem to act as a sort of contraceptive, preventing heats, and thereby preventing pregnancies, seeing as conceiving outside of heat is nearly impossible.

“But you must be careful,” she tells him very sternly at the end of her little lecture, meeting his gaze directly and narrowing her eyes as though to be certain he is taking her seriously, which he certainly is. This sort of thing had never been discussed with him before he left home, and certainly he hadn’t received any education of this sort in the Navy, where almost all the older men who might have taught him are betas and alphas, and it is assumed that all of the younger boys would be betas and alphas as well, or else leave the service sooner or later. “These is powerful, truly powerful. I’ve known omegas to sicken and wither right before my eyes, using ‘em too long and too hard.”

“I’ll be careful,” Laurence assures her, sketching a brief bow from the waist, his fists clenched tight around the herbs she had given him. As far as he is concerned, they are more precious than gold. 

Of course, it is very easy to _say_ that, he thinks somewhat grimly on his way back to the ship, but far harder to ensure that he will actually be able to keep his word, given that there will be very little opportunity when he is months at sea to disappear for a few days unnoticed in order to have a heat — nevermind the ridiculous idea that even if he did manage to sneak away, the close quarters somehow wouldn’t make it immediately obvious that _some_ omega was nearby and very much of interest to them. But he has, at the very least, the first part of his solution, and for the rest he will make do. 

Far be it from him to let a matter as little as his personal health get in the way of his duty.

—

There are times, of course, when he _does_ consider what it might be like to reveal to his commanding officers that he has presented, that he is an omega, and request to leave the service. He is not at all without prospects, should he leave; one of his very latest letters from home had conveyed that Edith has lately presented as a beta, meaning that there is at least still the possibility that they could yet be mated with only a minimum of scandal, though of course the most traditional families still scoff at the idea of omegas mated to anyone but alphas. Laurence, though, finds himself with no particular preference for alphas over betas, though since presenting he finds he has rather stopped noticing other omegas much at all, not that he had much before. 

But every time that thoughts of mating, of returning home to settle into his role as a partner and assist in the management of an estate rather than maintaining his current position aboardship, enter his mind, it seems that it takes only one stiff sea breeze to knock them back out again. By the time it has been almost a year since his presenting heat, Laurence is fully decided: he is no less committed to his path now than he had been when he ran from his home at only twelve. There will be no returning to shore, or, at least, not for quite some time.

Managing his heats is not so terribly difficult: now that he has been through it once, it is remarkably easy to recognize even the earliest signs — his body is deeply attuned to it — and, anyway, after the first few they are very regular, coming once a month like clockwork. As soon as he begins to feel a heat coming on, with the first stages usually coming a few days before the heat proper would have overtaken him, Laurence will sneak off to his scant personal belongings and prepare himself a rather potent mug of a very particular tea, which will knock him out nearly cold for one night and then completely block off his oncoming oestrus. 

He _does _feel, as the months pass one by one, that the physical effects are becoming greater and greater; he becomes more and more tired, through the duration of when the heat should have been, and after six months in a row of ruthlessly suppressing his heats he finds that rather than just a night of solid sleep and lethargy, he begins to also experience frequent vomiting, which unfortunately is taken as sea-sickness, a knock to his reputation which he could have done without. All of the vomiting also means that he begins to lose weight at a rather alarming pace — no less alarming because ship’s rations offer him little chance to try and put the weight back on. The vomiting stops when his heat should have ended, but he still finds himself pale and gaunt, and of course, the heat only comes again the next month.

By the ninth such month, Laurence has begun to grow a little desperate; he has no idea what he will do to manage, until he realizes very suddenly that this time, he will be in port once again for the duration of his heat. It seems almost a miracle, though of course the real miracle is that he manages to conceal his pre-heat scent without the aid of the herbs, which nix it just as surely as they prevent the heat itself; normally, it isn’t obvious at all from his scent that he might be an omega, seeing as he is so much surrounded by the often rather pungent odors of the sea itself. Sailors’ noses are often joked about as being particularly dull for this reason, topped only by stable-boys and coal miners, though of course in any of these cases it isn’t so much that one’s senses are dull, precisely, just that they are often overpowered. 

Heat-scent, though — or pre-heat, in this case — is rather enough to overcome even the most inundated of noses, especially for an alpha, who tend to have stronger noses for these things anyway. And, of course, while many of the crew are betas, many are also alphas, and therefore Laurence, once he realizes he will actually be proceeding with his heat for once, begins to prepare, cleaning himself fastidiously at every opportunity so that his scent will not have a chance to collect in sweat on his skin or clothes, if at all possible — which, of course, is not usually a liberty one has aboard ship, and has to be done almost entirely with seawater. But the seawater has a much stronger scent than fresh water would have had, anyway, and as long as he is able to stave off the first inklings that his scent may have changed, he doesn’t mind being considered a bit obsessed with the neatness of his own image.

And, any road, he gets to shore fine, and makes it to a heat-house — now that he has had a little more time to understand what’s happened to him, and what resources there are for unmated omegas in positions similar to his own, he need no longer resort to regular inns — without being followed or accosted in any sense. The door to the room he’s rented locks securely behind him, and there are strongly-scented flowers and herbs by the windows, doors, and walls to try and contain his scent, and the bed is spare, with only a sheet and thin blanket, because it isn’t going to matter to him how nice the covers are, and this way there will be less to be cleaned, afterwards. 

It may not be perfect — it may not ever be perfect — but, Laurence thinks as he lays himself down on the bed, his attitude toward the occasion of heat itself only slightly improved from last time, if it is not perfect, then at least it is working. All wisdom he knows says that an omega’s heats decrease in both frequency and intensity as they age; surely this is the worst of it, and he has managed just fine thus far. 

He may, he thinks as he reaches down to unlace his trousers, make captain yet.

—

The dragon Temeraire proves to be something of a complication.

Being the captain of his own ship had afforded Laurence certain additional liberties which had made the continued concealment of his designation much easier — and, as he had rather blindly hoped as a teenager, his heats had indeed become less intense with time, now troubling him only once every two months, meaning he could go well over a year suppressing them before he started to feel any ill effects. But that, of course, was as a Naval captain, who might reasonably expect to be ashore for some time every year, and thereby able to seclude himself in privacy and deal with his heats that way.

The Aerial Corps, he realizes very soon after their arrival at Loch Laggan, does not offer similar liberties.

He mulls over the possibilities at Temeraire’s side, as they read together, as they drill in formation, as Laurence slowly integrates himself into the life of the covert. Of course, he already feels, with a devotion which only grows with each passing day, that he would not trade Temeraire for anything or anyone — but such a feeling, no matter how powerful, nevertheless cannot easily solve the practical problems with which he now finds himself faced.

While they were still aboard the _Reliant_, Laurence had come to understand, through a series of incredibly awkward questions posed by his dragonet following some minor hubbub around one of the men of his crew secluding himself to see out an unexpected rut, that dragons do not have designations as humans do — that is, they are separated only into broader categories of _male_ and _female_, where only females might lay eggs and only males might fertilize them, or, at least, this had been Temeraire’s understanding. He had been both confused and markedly intrigued by the concept that human breeding — and society — is further complicated by designation on top of sex or gender, and while Laurence had at length managed to beg off any especially uncomfortable questions, there had been one which he could not quite avoid.

_Why then, Laurence, what is _your_ designation?_

He smiles ruefully, now, to think of the way he had stuttered and obfuscated, thankful only for the fact that no one had seemed to be in earshot even of Temeraire’s rather less than discreet volume. But even then, he had known that he could not lie to Temeraire, nor hope to conceal from him what he had always quite concealed from everyone else — even his family, to the best of his knowledge, thinks him a beta, since he has made very certain to give no sign of heat nor rut in their presence, and avoided to the best of his ability what few outright questions his father and mother have posed over the years. 

So, eventually, he had managed to choke out that he was, in fact, an omega — “But, my dear,” he had added immediately, “you musn’t tell anyone. You must _promise _me. You mustn’t say anything, you mustn’t even hint.”

Temeraire had blinked somewhat owlishly at him, those bright blue eyes gone wide. “But, Laurence, why? Surely—”

“No one knows, Temeraire,” Laurence had interrupted him, somewhat desperately. “And no one _can _know.”

“But —” Temeraire had chuffed a little bit, more confused than upset. “But _why?”_

“Because,” Laurence had said, his voice softening even as a grim smile washed over his face. “I doubt omegas can be dragon-captains any more than they can be the captains of ships, my dear.”

And _that_ had lead to quite a longer explanation of not just the biology of the alpha, beta, and omega designations — “Well, no, there’s not any physical restriction, I suppose” — but also the political and social mores which they incited — “but it isn’t _proper_” — which Temeraire did not seem at all content with. 

“But clearly, Laurence,” he said stubbornly, “since you are an omega, and a captain, and no one has ever had any cause to complain about you, that must be proof that an omega _can_ do whatever he should wish, and do it well.”

Even now, Laurence hasn’t quite worked up a counter-argument to that, because as far as he can tell, Temeraire isn’t precisely _wrong_ — it’s just that Laurence is quite certain that no one else would see it that way, or at least no one with the power to enforce the idea, no matter how long Temeraire or anyone else might sit and argue with them. So they had both gone away from that conversation a little unhappy, but Temeraire had, at least, agreed to say nothing to anyone about Laurence’s designation, and he has thus far kept his word; Laurence had managed if nothing else to convince him that, regardless of his own opinions on the matter, there are plenty of men who would do their very best to tear them apart, should they find out that Laurence is an omega, and Temeraire, of course, would sooner cut off his own wings than let that happen. 

But all of that, of course, had relied on the understanding that Laurence had held all his life of the admittedly rather mysterious Aerial Corps, which is to say: while aviators kept apart from most of society by dint of their devotion to their beasts, the general structure and rules of the Corps were similar to that of any other arm of the military, not so different from how the Navy or the Army were run. And somehow even the entirely unexpected discovery of female serving-officers wasn’t enough to fully shake this notion, perhaps because there was a sort of logical condition which not only allowed it, but indeed mandated it: of course women must be allowed to serve, if Longwings would have no other captains. As far as Laurence can tell, however, there is no reason that omegas should be required to serve, and therefore no reason that they should be allowed to, at least not to any real significance of rank.

Therefore Laurence is really of the mind that, all things considered, his reaction at present is relatively contained.

“Heat-leave?” he repeats, only a little faintly, and Granby frowns slightly, his brows pinching together a little.

“Yes, sir,” he says, looking more baffled than anything. “I’m sorry, I suppose I thought someone would have made you aware…?”

_Heat-leave_, Laurence repeats again, though thankfully in his own head this time. That Granby is mated is something of a shock, but within the bounds of believable possibility; that he is a beta is something Laurence had known, because it is the kind of thing he needs to know about all of his men, as their commanding officer, to accommodate for any potential designation-based conflicts of personality. 

That Granby is requesting heat-leave so that he might care for his mate, who is an omega, but more importantly, _who is a fellow captain_ — and that Granby had tossed that last bit out as though it were nothing at all — is the part which has him entirely thunderstruck.

“I,” Laurence says, grasping desperately for some sense of propriety or structure to this conversation that might allow him to row himself back to shore, but well aware that he is completely adrift. “I — well — no, I was not… made aware. But of course, if… yes. Of course, Lieutenant.”

Granby, however, is still squinting at him a little, plainly confused. “I’m sorry, sir,” he says slowly, clearly trying to puzzle out the source of Laurence’s reaction. “I would have told you myself, only we’ve been mated for near three years now, I didn’t even think of it. That’s my mistake.”

“No,” Laurence says, his voice growing only slightly more steady. “No, of course, not at all — I don’t think to inquire into the private lives of everyone in my command.” He hesitates for a moment, and then, in the closest approximation of propriety which can be managed, adds, “Forgive me, but to be certain I have the right of it… you said your mate is a captain?”

Granby nods, though his expression makes it very clear that he still doesn’t understand what the source of Laurence’s confusion is. “Yes, sir. On Immortalis.”

“Right,” Laurence says, with a last, comprehensive effort to marshall himself back into the role of the commanding officer, rather than the gawping loon. “Yes. Well. Very well then, Lieutenant Granby, of course that can be arranged; with Temeraire’s injury, we are after all grounded at the moment regardless. I suspect we can find some agreement on who should temporarily take on your duties…”

_An omega captain_, Laurence thinks somewhat dizzily that evening, curled against Temeraire’s foreleg. And an omega captain mated to another man in the service, no less — a man below his own rank, though safely enough outside of his command not to cause any undue alarm. And an omega captain who is, as Laurence understands it, to be a part of the very same formation as he and Temeraire, once their training is a bit more advanced — he had recognized the name as soon as Granby had spoken it, and he now finds himself perhaps unduly nervous about the man serving so close at hand, as though he himself might somehow be brought under suspicion by association, which logically he knows is terribly unlikely. But, really — an _omega_ captain.

Good God, how has he not _noticed?_

And sure enough, now that he’s looking for it, he has to wonder if he’s been blind or just helplessly self-absorbed as he adjusted to his life in the Corps, because the signs, while not necessarily obvious, are plentiful, when one is looking for them. Omegas are still under-represented in the Corps — they make up far less of the service than the two-tenths or so which they figure in the population at large — but they are certainly not _un_represented. There are omegas in the ground crews, the flight crews, and the riflemen, among the lieutenants and even the captains — Granby’s mate is not some anomaly or exception, as Laurence at first thinks he must be; there are _multiple_ omega captains in the Corps, and what’s more, while no one seems inclined to gossip openly about them in a tawdry sort of way, it is also clear that their presence in the Corps is far from a _secret_. Knowing now what to listen for, Laurence catches snatches of practical discussion over scent-blockers (advice he abashedly but determinedly eavesdrops on), off-hand mentions of heat-leave and complaints about inconvenient “cycling,” and the occaisional scrap of gossip about mating within or without the Corps which makes no real secret of the designations of those involved.

But then, it makes sense, really; it’s no secret _within_ the Corps that some aviators are female, either. Even so, however, the comparison is not perfect; clearly everyone knows that women serving is somewhat atypical, and not known by anyone outside the small circle of aviators and their close kin, and the way Granby had been so baffled by Laurence’s own bafflement makes him think that that might not be the case when it comes to omegas serving.

He can’t simply _ask_ — or, rather, he supposes he _could_, in theory, but he refuses to in practice — but at the same time, he has no idea how to respond to the situation without more context. For one thing, what is he going to do when Temeraire eventually hears tell of omega captains, when Laurence had had to try to thoroughly to convince him that such a thing is impossible in order to keep his own secret?

And for another thing, what might this mean for _him?_

—

Things seem to be going well in Dover until the moment when Jane Roland tries to kiss him.

In the very second after it happens, he realizes that he should have tried to find some way to avoid it without making it so obvious a refusal, but by that point it is too late: he has flinched away from her, drawing back with far more strength than he had meant to, and flung himself several feet across the room. She is staring at him, plainly shocked, though at least she doesn’t look angry; he’s not sure what he would do to shield against the well-deserved anger she might level at him after such a reaction — especially not without revealing the reason for his refusal, which certainly isn’t because of any disdain for her company, or, he thinks somewhat miserably, even a lack of interest on his part. But she only seems a little embarrassed, and not angry, and she doesn’t attempt to approach him again; indeed, she only says, “Oh, I am terribly sorry, Laurence. I didn’t think —”

“It’s quite all right,” he interrupts, his voice perhaps somewhat higher-pitched than normal. “That is to say, I’m very sorry. I can hardly excuse such a reaction; I pray you will not take it as a judgement upon your person or your character. I should hate to tarnish our friendship in such a way.”

“Breathe, my dear man,” Jane replies, clearly amused; he relaxes at the ease and lightheartedness of her tone, and relaxes still more when she adds, “You don’t need to apologize to me for anything. A no is a no, and you needn’t worry that I’ll think any less of you for it. Now, come,” she adds briskly, “let’s not fuss over the matter too much. Would you like another glass of wine?”

He accepts the change in subject willingly enough, and her easy attempts to put the event behind them, but Laurence nevertheless cannot help but feel guilty. Jane is a lovely woman, and a very talented aviator, and in any other circumstance, he finds that he would wholeheartedly enjoy taking her up on whatever exactly she is willing to offer. As a fellow captain, she understands his new life better than nearly any other woman in England could ever do; and beyond that, he _likes_ her, her company and her conversation. 

But there is absolutely no way he can engage in a casual relationship of any kind with any alpha, not unless he wants to risk his own designation being revealed. And Jane Roland, no matter what else she might be — how lovely a woman, or how valued an acquaintance and hopeful friend — is most certainly an alpha.

It would be obvious, he reflects on his way back to his own room, somewhat miserably, even if she hadn’t outright told him, earlier in their acquaintance — but at least then he might have had some sort of plausible excuse. As it is, he sees no way around the issue, and seeing as a romantic or sexual entanglement does not seem to be a prerequisite for her friendship, he certainly cannot justify the risk.

“You seem unwell, Laurence,” Temeraire asks him the next morning, visibly concerned. He hesitates a moment, then adds in what at least seems to be an _attempt _at lowering his voice, “Is it your—”

“No, my dear, I assure you I am quite well,” Laurence says, cutting him off before he has the chance to discover if Temeraire is discreet enough to say something like _your medicine_, at least, rather than _your suppressants_, or worse, _your heat_ — though _your medicine_ would certainly still arouse all sorts of unwelcome curiosity from the members of his crew milling about to give him his breakfast. 

“But you don’t _look _well,” Temeraire says, bowing his head a little closer and quite ignoring the sheep which has been most recently brought for him, which brings Laurence a very particular feeling of warmth and fondness; he knows _exactly_ how concerned Temeraire must be to ignore his food like that. “If it’s not _that_, then what is it?”

Laurence sighs a little, looking around at the crew, who are all very diligently pretending to mind their own business as they go about their work; still, even if they aren’t trying to eavesdrop, there’s very little they can do about overhearing a conversation which is happening right in front of then, with one of the participants being a dragon, no less. Laurence can’t exactly fault them for it. 

Therefore, in the end, all he says is, “A personal matter, my dear.” He reaches out to rub Temeraire’s nose reassuringly. “I promise it is nothing to worry yourself over; it is all sorted out now, anyway, I am only moping about for no good reason.” He smiles, finding the expression not forced in the least, at the way Temeraire leans into his touch.

“Well,” the dragon says consolingly, “only let me know if you need me to squash anyone, for having upset you, and I will gladly do it. And in the meantime, perhaps being up in the air will do you some good, even if it is only maneuvers.”

It would take far more than a bit of interpersonal awkwardness to stop a statement like that from lifting Laurence’s spirits; he smiles again, this time more privately, and briefly touches his forehead to Temeraire’s snout, which is the only part he can easily reach at the moment.

“No, no squashing at all,” he says reassuringly. “I promise. You can save all your squashing for the French.”

Temeraire relaxes visibly, and turns back to his breakfast. “Well, good,” he replies, by which time his mouth is already full of nearly half a sheep. “I should hate to think of stomping on one of our friends, even if they _had_ upset you.”

—

Things even out with Jane, soon enough; she seems genuinely to have meant what she said, about not thinking any less of him for refusing her, and she seems almost to have forgotten the matter entirely, greeting him just as cheerfully and bracingly as she always has every time they see one another. It’s a relief, both in the sense that Laurence would have hated to lose their burgeoning friendship, and, unfortunately, in the sense that they have far greater worries: every day the tension in the air seems to get a little thicker, and before long it boils over in perhaps the most horrible way imaginable, with Praecursoris’ low wails echoing through all of Dover.

To say the dragons take it hard would be a tremendous understatement. To say that Laurence himself is less affected is no lie, but it is only by a slim margin that such a claim is preserved, and by the time he finds himself passing a bottle around with Berkley and Harcourt in the shadow of their dragons' wings, he is certainly far from concealing exactly how affected he has been.

The other two are no better, of course; Harcourt looks even worse off, though in a moment of clear-sighted self-assessment Laurence wonders if he isn't judging her with more concern on account of her sex, and therefore seeing her distress where he might look past Berkley's out of some sense of honor or good tact. Then again, she had been... closer with Choiseul than he believes any of them quite want to acknowledge a the moment, and had after all been the target of his attack; she is well within her rights to be the most upset among them, if such is the case.

Certainly she is wan and drawn, visibly shaken and miserable, which plays oddly with the flush of drink in her cheeks. Laurence hesitates only once in passing her the bottle, and she disavows him of any notions he might have had by snatching it from him with a stern look just shy of a glare. He nods, a little embarrassed, and doesn't make any move towards such behavior again.

But his lips are not thus stymied. He would like to think it is only the drink which has loosened his tongue — or, rather, he would like to think that he was in no such position at all, and he would_ like_ to think that they haven't between them consumed an entire bottle of strong rum already, and begun working on a second with no shortage of determination and speed, but it has been a horrible, horrible time, and try as he might to ignore it, he can still hear Praecursoris from all the way on the other side of the covert. At any rate, Laurence in all fairness cannot say that it is only his drunkenness, whether or not said drunkenness is earned, which leads him to speak; the truth of the matter is, he is unsettled enough that he rather feels like he might say anything at all even without the influence of the drink.

He looks across at Harcourt — Catherine, as Choiseul had called her, and as Rankin had called her, both men who, Laurence realizes in a sudden burst of sodden insight, used her more obviously feminine given name as a means of manipulation; in his current state, he must admit that he is rather proud of this deduction — and above her, his eyes track slowly up in the moonlight and lantern-light to trace over the great shadow of Lily's wings. Harcourt, who certainly does have more right to be upset than any of them, and who certainly does look deeply and truly shaken, and yet who also looks as though she is made of iron, or perhaps dragon-bone: even though she must be as drunk as he is, or drunker, her spine is straight and stiff, and her face may be drawn, but her gaze is intense, her brow set.

So he looks at her, and whether because he is drunk or because he is merely upset and out of his mind a little with worry and frustration, he says, "You know, Captain, if I may, I think it is the height of injustice that we may not be plain about the fact that so many of our aviators are women of honor and character, such as yourself."

Berkley and Harcourt both look at him askance, as though he has grown a second head; indeed, Laurence himself starts a little when he parses through what he's said, after the fact, and he contemplates it, but he finds that there is nothing in his statement which does not satisfy him — at least in his present condition — as not only true, but eminently worth saying. Therefore, rather than attempt to walk his statement back or offer any sort of caveat, he simply nods, decisively, and takes another swig from the bottle, which he is mildly surprised to discover has wound up back in his possession at some point.

After a long moment of silent, Harcourt says rather blankly, "Well, it's not so very many of us, really," sounding very much as though this is the only part of Laurence's statement she has any hope of addressing.

"Nonsense," Laurence insists, gesturing at her very slightly with the bottle, and then passing it along amiably when she reaches for it. "It's many enough. I will admit, I was — shocked as anything, when I first found out, but I would far rather have you, or Ja — Captain Roland, than any ten of Choiseul, or — or Rankin, or," and then he gestures again, bottle-less this time, intending to convey that, while he has been very lucky, for the most part, in his own acquaintances, he's sure that there are unfortunately more than two bad eggs in all of the Aerial Corps.

Berkley snorts a little, taking the bottle from Harcourt next, and salutes Laurence with it rather more expansively than he had done. "Well, I don't know about letting the secret out just yet, but I'll drink to that, at least."

"Letting the secret out, indeed," Harcourt says, snorting herself — not an entirely ladylike sound, of course, but not inappropriate at all for the current setting. "Not that I’m devoted to keeping myself hidden from the world, or any such — but I'd rather not deal with the fuss that would come of it, at least not right now, if it's all the same to you. Let's win this bloody war first, hey?"

"Hear, hear," Berkley calls approvingly, Laurence joining in only about a half-second too late; as their cry dies down, and Berkley takes another deep swig before passing the bottle once more to Laurence, they all fall back into silence. 

By this point Laurence thinks he must be truly drunk, or else the matter with Choiseul and Praecursoris must have driven him truly mad; he has no real account, otherwise, as to why he thinks at all to open his mouth again.

“But you know,” he says very quietly — so quietly, in fact, that he might almost hope that Harcourt and Berkley don’t hear him, except that they both go very still, and he can feel their eyes on him at the dark even as he bows his head to stare resolutely down at the ground — “it wasn’t even really that there are women in the service that surprised me most.”

Harcourt remains silent, but Berkley laughs a bit gruffly, shifting in his place.

“And what, then, was more shocking to your Naval sensibilities?” he says, perhaps somewhat more bluntly than he would have without the rum, though with him it is admittedly somewhat difficult to tell.

Here at last, when he has already said enough to potentially rouse suspicion, Laurence hesitates; but he glances up just slightly, and sees both of them indeed watching him, their eyes shining in the faint light, and he hears Temeraire breathing steadily, clearly almost asleep if he is not yet under entirely. He closes his eyes only briefly, then looks down again, and he says softly, “Never in my life — never in all my years in the Navy did I hear of anything like an omega captain.” He only hopes that he does not sound as wistful to his companions as he does to his own ears, or at least that they will not remember it clearly in the morning.

Harcourt makes a low, surprised sort of noise, but after a beat of slightly uncomfortable silence, Berkley’s bluntness once again comes to the rescue. Reaching across their little huddle, he claps Laurence strongly on the shoulder — somewhat more strongly, in fact, than he probably would have were he sober, though again, it can be difficult to tell — and says, “Well, here you are in a formation with Harcourt and Little, and thick as thieves with Roland Senior, from what I hear — omegas and women all around. ‘Spose you’ve gotten over both of those, then, eh?”

Laurence smiles at him, finding the expression not precisely difficult to summon, but _odd_, as though it is coming from a different place inside him than it normally does. “Yes,” he says, his eyes flicking across to Harcourt as he speaks; she is watching him with what he thinks might be camaraderie, or even affection. “Yes, I suppose I have.”

Really, he thinks, if this whole mess has taught him anything — anything beyond that he cannot trust too blindly, that is, even within their own covert — it must be something to the effect of the very idea that sent him to sea in the first place, and then lead him, eventually here to Dover, and more importantly, _here_, with Temeraire and his fellow aviators and their dragons. It must, indeed, be this: if every citizen has a duty to serve their country, then business what on Earth does any other person have preventing them from doing so? When there are traitors — and, at a somewhat less extreme level, cowards, and cruel-hearted men of every station, and liars, and thieves — who are allowed to serve, and still others who would do anything in their power to prevent being forced to, why in God’s name should a person of character who _wishes_ to serve in honor be turned away?

Perhaps he had said it slightly less eloquently than he might have liked to — and with far more slurring — but Laurence had said only what he truly believed: he would _absolutely_ take ten of Captain Harcourt, or of Jane, or for that matter of Little or any of the other omegas in the service, over any number of people with less talent and conviction. He would find it impossible to deny, of course, that there is something self-serving in the notion; Berkley and Harcourt might not know it — and, by God, he only _hopes_ that they still do not know it — but he does, of course, count among that number as well. He only hopes that his service is deemed half as useful in the eyes of his comrades as theirs is in his own eyes.

Still, he might be permitted a bit of self-service in this case, or at least that is what the alcohol is telling him. Surely recent events have been more than horrible enough to earn any of them some small amount of self-service — perhaps he will regret even thinking so in the morning, but at the moment, Laurence feels rather defiant about the whole idea. After all, has he not done his duty? He has long concealed his designation, yes, that much is obvious and inarguable, and might easily be counted as a lie; but has he not done it in the service of his country? Has he not, at least, done so for such a purpose that he might still mark himself as different than a traitor without question? Is he not still in an entirely different world than a man like Choiseul?

He tips his head up to the sky as Berkley and Harcourt pick up a quiet conversation once more across from him; the moon is half-covered by one of Lily’s great wings, but if he squints through his slightly wavering vision he can make out all manner of stars.

**Author's Note:**

> Adhara, Avior, and Gienah are each the names of stars utilized in celestial navigation. Adhara, a binary star which is part of the constellation Canis Major, is known as "the virgins"; Avior is a coined name for a star in the constellation Carina, which is sometimes mistaken for the Southern Cross; and finally, Gienah is a binary star in the constellation Corvus, the raven. Gienah, in particular, is the right wing of the raven.


End file.
